Tag Archives: Betty Draper

The first time I had an inkling that modern-day parenting had gone haywire was when I took my son to a playground for the first time.

I distinctly remember like it was yesterday my toddler making his way up and around the playground apparatus. I raced around on the ground around the jungle gym trying to anticipate his next move so that I could be there to catch him if he fell or hurdled his body off in the wrong direction. I was exhausted, running circles around this thing trying to avoid his untimely death.

After about ten minutes, I thought “This is really tiring – how do people do this?”

I looked around and noticed that there were several mothers actually on the playground with their kids.

I was the only mom on the ground.

Huge women were plunging through tunnels, going down the slide and talking into the speaker piece on ground level, requesting cheeseburgers and coffees from their child on the other side.

This mom was having WAY too much fun…..

I held my toddler and stared at these women with my mouth open in shock and awe. Not one child was playing with another child, every child had a huge adult counterpart to play with. It was as though I was living a creepy Alice in Wonderland type nightmare. It was insane.

I think this mom crushed her child to death on the way down….

I spent many years at said playground.

You too Jennifer Garner?? Really??

If you take notice you will find at playgrounds all across America, there are inevitably mothers on the equipment posing as playmates for their young children.

I have been guilty of it myself. When the kids would ask me to play with them – I have been known to order a dirty martini over the microphone or take a couple swings on a tire swing.

But as my children are older, I have come to realize that this playground play is exactly where the trouble starts. We are setting these kids up for disaster by not letting them learn to PLAY ALONE!!!

These poor neglected kids didn’t have a mom to play with so they didn’t know what to say into the microphone. With nobody ordering lattes on the other end – they didn’t know what to do so they just quietly pretended they were taking showers…..

My third grader has had some recent difficulty navigating the social scene during recess.

He sits at an assigned seat at lunch at his institutionalized lunch table eating prison food (if he buys) and then he files out the door (like a prisoner) to recess. Here he searches for kids who he knows from lunch or class to play with.

However, it seems that “play” doesn’t come easily for a generation of kids used to ordering french fries from their mother on the playground for 5 years.

While some kids play games or sports, he tells me about the group of kids that are cub scouts that go off and talk about their “secret Cub Scout stuff.” It seems that kids seem to pair off with specific agendas and cannot be swayed to do something else or play with someone else.

My son was friends with these kids in kindergarten that ended up being in a weird cub scout cult in 3rd grade and he is not now, nor will ever be a cub scout.

As you can imagine Mr. Gaga is not about to wear some weird pinned shirt with “nut hugger shorts” so Cub Scouts is not part of the acceptable Gaga activity list.

This leaves Michael at a loss of what to do during recess, as the “supercool cub scout kids” won’t let him play with them because they are busy talking about secret “cub scout stuff.”

Initially he thought that he should join the cub scouts and that would solve his problems – but we quickly put the kibosh on that…

If this is what it takes to have friends at recess – then sadly Michael will playing alone for the rest of his life….

“I don’t know – maybe it will be fine, I mean what did you do during recess in 3rd grade?” I asked Mr. Gaga.
“I don’t know – played kickball…” he answered. “What did you do?”

“Well…..I don’t remember……I remember one time we were at recess and this girl who had like 6 older brothers and sisters told us there was no such thing as Santa Claus and then one time a kid was swinging and he jumped off the swing in the air and broke his arm, and I also I remember that there was a clear glue that was oozing out of the bricks on the school building – and we used to pretend it was gum. We would run up to the wall and say “Oh…it’s gum!” and run away.”

He stared at me with disgust. “Well, I think it’s safe to say where he gets his recess troubles…”

He could be right.

We have helped guide him with ideas and suggested other kids to play with. It is sad to imagine him drifting alone on the playground, I desperately want him to be happy during the mere 20 minutes of freedom that he has during his long days as a prisoner of “core curriculum training.”

While I have not been happy about his recess struggles, I chalk it up to being a fact of life, and something that he has to figure out.

While Mr. Gaga and I are able to rationally sit down and discuss things and get to the root of our troubles (my poor recess skills as a child and our mutual disdain for the cubscouts) – the rest of this town can’t seem to get it together.( What else is new?)

It seems Michael is not the only child having social difficulty during recess.

In the latest act of helicopter parenting – parents have complained about recess enough that the principal of an elementary school in town has sent out a request for parent volunteers for recess.

You heard correctly.

Parent volunteers will be on hand during recess everyday – to guide children at play and help them decide who and what to play with.

I can’t believe that parents have once again decided to interfere and become involved with yet another arena that has nothing to do with them to protect their children.

No matter what troubles Michael might be having – the last thing I want is some bored stupid twat mother telling him what to do!!!

At what point will this generation of children be allowed to play or interact on their own? Isn’t enough that you went down the slide with them until they were 8 years old? Will anyone ever cut the cord??

I’ll never let little Hunter swing alone….Never!

It is shocking and disappointing to think that one day this new policy might be in place at my children’s school as well.

Although it disgusts me and I find it beyond offensive to imagine children being herded into groups and told who to play with by some bored housewife….

I will have no choice but to volunteer to be sure that I am getting a chance to “help my kids play.”

Let’s hope that this policy doesn’t become the norm.

Believe me when I tell you….the last thing any of you want is for me to be a parent volunteer at your kid’s recess….

They said you couldn’t play with them? Go back over there and kick every single kid in the balls and tell them their mothers are fat whores….

Linking up to Mama Kat’s Writer’s workshop for the topic of “RECESS”……

JUST WHEN I THINK I MIGHT RUN OUT OF MATERIAL THE PARENTS OF TODAY SAVE THE DAY!! PLEASE CLICK THE LINK BELOW TO VOTE FOR ME AS THE FUNNIEST MOM IN AMERICA!!! XO, LADY GOO GOO GAGA

So last week I was preparing to leave for a very important work-related project. I had to figure out all of the child-care for 4 days and 4 nights. I also had to scramble about gathering necessary information and supplies for work. I also had to deal with my older son being diagnosed with strep throat in the midst of this. I also had to deal with Mr. Gaga getting prepared for his “procedure,” which would take place the morning after I was set to leave.

I figured out the childcare with help from my in-laws – who came from NY and babysat and took the kids for a few days. This was a HUGE relief and help, and I really should give them a shout-out. I haven’t mentioned them much but apparently just enough to leave a distinct impression. When I told a friend my childcare plan – she said – “Well that will be good – just pack them each one pair of khakis and they can just wear them for 4 days.”

Anyways – so that was one problem solved. Then there was poor Mr. Gaga. Because of the fact that he failed his first colonoscopy that (my Dad brought him to over the summer because I was “busy”) – he was due for another procedure. I kept reminding him to schedule it – and he never did – so I just finally made the appointment for him.

Once I booked the appointment – they told me that he would have to do twice the amount of “prep” than usual. I had to iron out some stuff with the pharmacy and make sure he had all of his crazy drinks for his 3 days of fasting.

This poor man had to fast for over 48 hours!!! Also – instead of drinking one jug of “Colon-blow” – he had to drink two jugs of “Colon-blow”!!! It was borderline – “cruel and unusual punishment.” I was wondering if you could possibly get killed doing this inhumane preparation, but I had never heard anyone’s cause of death being “colonscopy prep,” – so he followed the instructions.

I had made his appointment a couple of months ago – and of course it fell right smack in the middle of this crazy week – when I would be away for work, which was problematic.

We figured out a way that my brother would bring him to his appointment and my father would pick him up while his father would be at our house getting children fed and to school at the crack of dawn. (When this was all happening I would be getting my hair blown out at Drybar – before I started my work day – which by the way was quite lovely.)

So those arrangements were made – Mr. Gaga started his fasting and by the end of day one was quite delerious. In the meantime – I was getting more and more stressed and nervous about work and guilty for leaving the kids, and I found out that I had to attend a wake on Tuesday around the time I had planned on leaving.

I kept trying to go over details with Mr. Gaga - but he just would stare at me blankly and not respond......

So finally I made my way Tuesday afternoon – Mr. Gaga was home on the toilet talking in tongues and the kids were going to eat dinner and go to bed. I stopped at the wake – and then I was on my way to New York.

When I arrived – I checked in with Mr. Gaga – said goodnight to the kids and tried to relex and not stress about my big day ahead.

At 9:30 PM – my phone rang. It was Mr. Gaga.

“Lady?”

“Yes, what’s wrong?”

“I just opened my paperwork for tomorrow morning’s procedure to look at the address…” he said in a monotone voice of a starving man.

“Yeah…”

“Why does it say here that my colonoscopy is scheduled for March 9th?”

Cold sweat broke and vomit started to crawl up my throat.

I quickly grabbed my planner to make sure I wrote down February 22nd…

“Um, I don’t know…..I mean I know that your appointment is tomorrow….”

Silence.

“Do you know what’s going to happen if I get there and they turn me away?” Mr. Gaga asked as his voice started to rise.

“You are going to divorce me?” I thought in my head….

“Um – just go there and tell them they made a mistake and it will be fine.”

We hung up – and I tossed and turned all night with nightmares about Mr. Gaga being turned away and him murdering me.

Thank God – they took pity on him and they squeezed him in – and the rest of the time I was away was smooth sailing.

And when I say “thank God” I really mean it ….Do you know what could have happened?

I was a little afraid that that small little detail that I had messed up……might ….just might…..be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

What if Mr. Gaga was mad at me about that little mix-up and he said –

“Get home – where you belong and stop fucking with our lives?”

Remember that time when I escaped and was working on Park Avenue and someone was blowdrying my hair for me every morning.......Sigh.....I really screwed that up ...now I'm back in this god-dammned kitchen again.....

Even though I have been waiting almost 6 years for this…now that I am not going to have any children in the 3 and under category, I feel a little bit like a slacker.

I know – you think I am crazy – but I feel like maybe my life isn’t as torturous as it once was, and maybe I am not allowed to complain anymore. I mean when I see Moms lugging strollers and diaper bags into the library or the store, with bags under the eyes, it seems like a million years ago that I was in their position. But what I would like to know is – can I still say I’m tired? Because I really am!! I truly don’t remember the last time I wasn’t tired.

When I am out and about in town, I wear my sunglasses at all times to not make eye contact with people I don’t like, to hide the fact that I look like a bag of shit and have had chronic dark circles for 5 years. My sunglasses of choice have been an old pair of black Pradas that are the perfect shape to cover a good portion of my face and are really dark – so nobody can see my eyeballs. They have been sat on, dropped, thrown in the sandbox, etc. I can barely see out of them because of all the scratches. It’s borderline insane that I wear them, if you look at me when I’m wearing them – you will just see crazy scratch marks all over both lenses. When people ask about the situation I just say – “I know its horrible – I just haven’t had a minute to get new glasses.” Which is true – but what now – do I have to throw them out? What’s my excuse why I can’t do something so simple as get a new pair of sunglasses?

"Oh hi - I'm just here to pick up my son from preschool."

Even this past Christmas – I was arguing with my brother, who just had a baby, about where we would meet in the morning to open gifts.

“I’m not lugging my kids – taking them in and out of all of their seats and straps and carrying them into your house in the freezing cold – only to get back in the car to go to NY like an hour later.” I argued.

“What are you talking about? They are grown men! The get in and out of their booster seatsby themselves and walk to the door!” he replied.

“Oh right…..Damn it!!”

Also – can I still look like shit? Or do I need to start getting my act together? For a long time after I had S – people would ask me how old he was and I would say the wrong age. For example, if he was 7 months I would say 3 months – so people would think I looked good for having a 3 month old. Or my favorite was when S was 6 MONTHS OLD! and someone asked me when I was due. I said “Next week!” And they were like – “Oh you look so good!”

How long can I call this “baby weight?” I think when the last child is age 4, we have officially left the “baby-weight” stage and moved into the category of “Fat person.”

Aside from the fact that I am morbidly obese – I also think that I have to try to look a little more presentable in the wardrobe department. When I grab a shirt (from the pile of clothes in my room that I never seem to have time to put away) if there’s something on it, I don’t think I can say “Oh….the baby must have spit up on me!” when someone notices anymore.

In general, I have pretty much let myself go. I used to do weekly waxing appointments for lip,chin, brows, etc. color my hair every 2 weeks, cut every 8, manicure every week. Now the best way I can describe my maintenance schedule is by showing you the picture below of my facial hair as of last week before I finally couldn’t take it anymore and waxed it.

If I don’t have babies keeping me up all night, who am I to have this kind of moustache? Or gray roots showing? What’s my excuse to have my feet and toenails look like my grandfather’s?

For a long time having two baby boys 18 months apart, was something that got me off the hook. I wore my weathered, ragged look like a badge of honor. I was such a good mother – that I only could put all my energy towards raising these babies and had no time for frivolous matters like waxing my beard or putting together a matching outfit. I mean how does Betty Draper do it?

I guess having these kids grow up has some disadvantages. What’s next? I’m expected to have a clean house?